Did the Sun Stand Still? Phenomenal Language and God’s World through Human Eyes

For, to my mind, this is a certain principle, that nothing is here [in Genesis 1] treated of but the visible form of the world… It must be remembered, that Moses does not speak with philosophical acuteness on occult mysteries, but relates those things which are everywhere observed, even by the uncultivated, and which are in common use… Moses makes two great luminaries [sun and moon]; but astronomers prove, by conclusive reasons, that the star [i.e., planet] of Saturn, which, on account of its great distance, appears the least of all, is greater than the moon.

Here lies the difference; Moses wrote in a popular style things which, without instruction, all ordinary persons, endued with common sense, are able to understand; but astronomers investigate with great labour whatever the sagacity of the human mind can comprehend… If the astronomer inquires respecting the actual dimensions of the stars, he will find the moon to be less than Saturn; but this is something abstruse, for to the sight it appears differently. Moses, therefore, rather adapts his discourse to common usage.” – John Calvin, Commentaries on the First Book of Moses Called Genesis (Baker, 1979), 1.79 [on Gen. 1:6], 1.84 [on Gen. 1:14], 1.86-87 [on Gen. 1:16] (emphasis added).

Introduction

Rather than being the main focus of this article, Joshua 10:12-14 will serve as an illustration for the actual main focus. People ask, “Did the sun really stand still like the Bible says it did?” Well, God, who made all things from nothing and spoke into existence the things that prior to that speech did not exist (Romans 4:17) is able to do whatever He so pleases in heaven and on earth (Psalm 115:3). In worshipful adoration, we ask together with all the believers of all time, “Is anything too hard for God” (Genesis 18:14)? So, the answer to that first question above is “yes.” But that “yes” does not entail all kinds of odd hypotheses about which the Divine and human authors never intended to address in that passage (or many others like it) in the first place. In terms of what I wish was still common sense, that answer is an unqualified “yes.” In terms of what has to be explained because of misunderstandings and misconceptions which abound like the proverbially antinomian idea about “grace,” the answer is a qualified “yes.” So, let’s explore the main subject of that qualified “yes”: phenomenological language.

A Test Case

“The heavens declare the glory of God; And the firmament sheweth his handiwork” (Psalm 19:1, KJV). We all know that “declaring” and “showing forth” or “making known” are actions that only people with mouths and minds can do.

So, when we see that the heavens are said to “declare” and the firmament is said to “show forth” or “explain” something, it is evident enough that the sky has a mouth (perhaps quite a large one, since the sky is no small thing) and the firmament has a mighty mind (among other things such as vocal chords and a big tongue) to be able to explain and show the work of God’s hands.

One of the best parts of each day is going outside to listen to the words about God that the sky speaks so loudly for us all to hear with our ears, not to mention the lovely voice of the rocks (Luke 19:40; Habakkuk 2:11). But certainly, this is not all that Psalm 19:1 has to teach us. What exactly is it that the firmament “makes known”? It makes known “the work of God’s hands.” God, in contradiction to the opinions of Protestantism, Catholicism, and even the apostle Paul Himself (Romans 1:20; 1 Timothy 1:17), has literal and visible hands by which he created the earth and everything in it. Perhaps the Mormons are correct when they tell us that God in his very nature has a corporeal body made of flesh and bone. That would seem to be the straightforward reading of Psalm 19:1, among a whole host of other passages of Scripture which speak of body parts that the God of all creation possesses, would it not?

Exegesis and Two Sins

Satire can be a most helpful medium, but only if it is truly recognized as such. Obviously, that is an absurd interpretation of verse 1 of Psalm 19. In general, Christians are able to recognize the different types of speech that Scripture gives us, but when a Scripturally foreign foundational presupposition becomes the driving force through which we understand everything in Scripture, we will be both inconsistent and arbitrary in our interpretation of God’s Word. We know from experience in dealing with others just how severe are what Dr. Greg Bahnsen calls the two great intellectual sins: arbitrariness and inconsistency (Bahnsen, Always Ready: Directions for Defending the Faith, Kindle Location 2625). These things, inconsistency and arbitrariness, are the two chief hallmarks of all falsehood and incorrect thinking. Instead of understanding Scripture in its own words on its own terms and so seeking out the authorial intent of a passage according to the layers of context present, we commit forms of ideological eisegesis, reading our own ideology into the words of Scripture, which forces both inconsistency and arbitrariness into our interpretational method. This is very much the opposite of exegesis which is drawing out from Scripture the meaning present within the text according to the intended meaning from the author.

Real exegesis takes hard work, and laziness combined with our prior assumptions make eisegesis as easy as sin; all you have to do is not even try, and you’re much further along in it than you ever thought you would be. The mistakes we all make as Christians when we interpret the Bible are, sadly, too numerous to count. But this is no excuse. There are many who are peddlers of God’s Word, but Christians recognize that real Christianity stands or falls on the submission to or the twisting of God’s Word. We are commanded by God to rightly handle God’s Word, avoiding irreverent babble which spreads like cancer and leads people into ungodliness, not being “peddlers of God’s word, but as men of sincerity, as commissioned by God, in the sight of God we speak in Christ” (2 Timothy 2:15-17; 2 Corinthians 2:17). But there are better ways.

This Article Isn’t Enough

In writing this, I am incredibly aware of the limitations of an article like this, which is why I urge and exhort you, the reader, not to be content with your present level of ignorance (as I strive not to remain content with mine) and seek out true and right ways of handling God’s Word by picking up and engaging deeply with these resources to be mentioned in a moment. Truly, this article can only be the smallest pebble in comparison with the boulders of these works by faithful men of God who have labored for decades, seeing and dealing with true and false interpretations of Scripture of all sorts. The depths of these issues cannot be adequately covered here, so again, I urge you, the reader, don’t be lazy, but diligent. Take up, read, and wrestle with the truths in these works.

Here they are in order of importance: Exegetical Fallacies by D. A. Carson; Interpreting Eden: A Guide to Faithfully Reading and Understanding Genesis 1-3 by Vern S. Poythress; How to Understand and Apply the Old Testament: Twelve Steps from Exegesis to Theology by Jason S. Derouchie; How to Understand and Apply the New Testament: Twelve Steps from Exegesis to Theology by Andrew David Naselli; Introduction to Logic: Informal Fallacies by Jason Lisle; and lastly, Biblical Words and Their Meaning: An Introduction to Lexical Semantics by Moisés Silva.

Phenomena: Starting with Definitions

In the brief, satirical commentary above, much could be solved with a few definitions of figures and uses of different kinds of speech. Metaphor, personification, and phenomenological language are just a few of these aids to understanding human language in general and the language of Scripture in particular, especially for our purposes here. Phenomenological language will be the central focus of this article, and phenomenological language is a phenomenal thing. Now that that sentence is out of the way, let’s get on with it.

We will start with the term “phenomena.” (See Youtube Video in Article). “Phenomena” is defined as, “the plural of ‘phenomenon’; a fact, occurrence, or circumstance [which is] observed or observable.” What is phenomenological language (or phenomenal language; the two terms are synonymous), and why is it significant for understanding Scripture? Hopefully, by our definition and by Calvin’s quote above, you can already see the basic point of it. Let’s move into it by way of a sword of false assumptions that cuts both ways.

Painful Irony From Liberals and their Unsuspecting Counterparts

In speaking about “the myth of scientistic metaphysics,” Vern Poythress explains how many believe that “knowledge from modern science surpasses the knowledge of the ancient world and tribal cultures that have no contact with modern civilization” (Poythress, Interpreting Eden: A Guide to Faithfully Reading and Understanding Genesis 1-3, p. 69; hereafter referred to as Eden). The basic idea of these more liberal interpreters is that when ancient texts like Old Testament books speak of “the sun rising” and “the sun setting,” this is evidence that the ancients had an unscientific and inferior understanding of cosmology, which supposedly shows that the Bible uses the erroneous assumptions of the people at the time as an imperfect ‘vehicle’ to carry the perfect ‘cargo,’ that is, the theology about God Himself. So, the ‘vehicle,’ (the false scientific assumptions of the authors and audiences of Scripture) serves to house the ‘cargo’ (the truths about God which go deeper than the imperfect vessel of ancient scientific misunderstanding in which the cargo is housed). Some Christians have responded to this claim by saying instead that, no, both the vehicle and the cargo explain true, scientifically and cosmologically accurate descriptions of the world and the universe, but then go on to defend this by adopting the same interpretations from the vehicle-cargo approach of those who are less than conservative in their theology.

Some of the interpretations between the liberals and groups of believing Christians remain the same, but whereas the liberals use this as evidence of the inferiority of Scripture as an authority, some conservatives adopt the interpretive assumptions of the liberals, but instead affirm the absurd interpretations as literally and physicalistically true in every sense, instead of false. Both sides commit the same error, apparently unaware of the real interpretational solution which removes the perceived difficulties on both sides: phenomenal (or phenomenological) language. Vern Poythress offers an excellent summary when he says that many Christians throughout church history “contented themselves with the principle that the Bible describes things as they appear.” At this point, he cites the lengthy quotation from Calvin’s commentary on the book of Genesis, referenced at the beginning of this article. He clarifies “phenomenal language” as “language describing how things appear to ordinary human observation.” Poythress then gives what I hope will be the main takeaway for Cultish readers: “The Bible characteristically uses phenomenal language. Once we recognize it, many of the elementary problems dissolve” (Eden, 70-71). Both sides, the faulty liberal interpretation as well as the faulty apparently conservative interpretation, seek to interpret specific portions of Scripture physicalistically (trying to find modern, scientific, and specific physicalistic descriptions of the physical structure of things Scripture speaks of) rather than interpreting those same parts of Scripture phenomenally, that is, with reference to the phenomena described in those passages according to how they appear to those seeing or experiencing them.

A Silly Illustration: Part 1

“The sunset is beautiful this evening,” exclaimed the head of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (founded July 29th, 1958). “What an ironic turn of events!” someone may say. “NASA doesn’t believe that the sun literally sets! This guy and the whole lot of them are contradicting their own professed worldview! They say that the earth goes around the sun, not the sun around the earth! So, how can they say that there is a “sunset” or that the “sun rises” and “sets” each day? Their own language betrays them, and they are caught in the inconsistency and self-destruction of their own professed beliefs!” Or… are they? One thing that many Christians don’t always realize is that the Bible was written in human language, and human language has standard conventions that every person uses every day without thinking about the specific aspects and differences among those conventions. Countless billions of people for the last several hundred years have believed that the earth orbits the sun, and the sun, relative to the earth, is mostly standing still (please follow the argument; I’m not making an argument from the majority opinion). Yet these same billions have never bothered to change their language when speaking of morning and evening and the sun’s apparent movements in relation to them. This is because we speak, without even thinking about it, phenomenally.

A Silly Illustration: Part Deux

A child, riding in the backseat of a car as it passes some large boulders might yell out, “Mommy, those rocks went by us so fast!” Was the child wrong? Was the child speaking unscientifically and in an improperly non-physicalistic way? No. Rather, the mother and the child (probably) recognize without even knowing the linguistic and philosophical terminology, that the child was speaking from his own perspective as he perceived it from his specific standpoint, his point of reference, at the time that he spoke. The boulders certainly were moving with respect to the reference point inside the car. The boulders were not moving with respect to the reference point of the land upon which the boulders lay. So, were the boulders moving or not? Would one answer be lying and the other be the real truth?

I hope that by this illustration, we can all see that when we are speaking of things that we see, things that we perceive, when it comes to objects that are in motion and we ask if something is moving or immobile, that the question, “moving or immobile with reference to what?” can help us understand that depending on the point of reference from which you are speaking, you could be telling “the truth” without speaking about that thing from every conceivable perspective beyond your own, limited point of reference (Eden, 72). As Poythress summarizes, “[This] mythic element involves the assumption that one observational standpoint is the original or right one. Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity places observers in accelerated systems on the same mathematical level with all other observers. An observer standing still on earth is one such observer. From the point of view of this scientific theory, the statement that the earth is moving is not intrinsically better than the statement that it is not. Both statements are ambiguous until we specify the observational standpoint. Either statement may be true, depending on what observational standpoint we specify. Equations of transformation allow us to move from one standpoint to the other” (Eden, 72-73, emphasis added).

Finally, The Joshua Passage

Joshua 10:12-14 says, “At that time Joshua spoke to the LORD in the day when the LORD gave the Amorites over to the sons of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, ‘Sun, stand still at Gibeon, and moon, in the Valley of Aijalon.’ And the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, until the nation took vengeance on their enemies. Is this not written in the Book of Jashar? The sun stopped in the midst of heaven and did not hurry to set for about a whole day. There has been no day like it before or since, when the LORD heeded the voice of a man, for the LORD fought for Israel.” A question that has no rational need for arising has, in fact, arisen concerning this passage. The question goes something like, “Since the Bible says that the sun stood still, doesn’t that imply that the sun was the thing that was moving, and the earth was the thing it was moving around?”

When we understand that so much of Scripture speaks with reference to the phenomena of things as they are perceived by the authors and the original audiences of Scripture, we can see that the question doesn’t even make sense. We shouldn’t try to find in Scripture the kinds of things the authors of Scripture never intended to explain; rather, we should try to find the kinds of things in Scripture that the authors of Scripture intended to explain, on their own terms, not ours. Did God cause a massive miracle to take place in which some heavenly bodies somehow stopped with reference to other heavenly bodies? Yes.

Does that mean that God and Joshua intended to make a cosmological statement about the motion of the earth with respect to the sun, rather than the movement of the sun with respect to the earth since the earth is the only possible point of reference for humans to have? Of course not. We err when we read every, extremely specific question we have about Scripture from our own potentially erroneous worldviews back into Scripture, looking for answers Scripture itself never intended to give.

For further illustration, imagine this miracle took place today, just as it did in the days of Joshua. Everyone on earth would exclaim, “Do you see that? The sun hasn’t moved for hours! It’s just standing still!” And yet, all these people would not be contradicting their heliocentric cosmology, because that’s simply not what they’re talking about. For more on Joshua 10, there are good commentaries on the book from conservative, believing scholars who hold to the ultimate and supreme authority of Scripture as inerrant and infallible, and for further comments on this passage, I would refer the reader to those: Dale Ralph Davis – Joshua: No Falling Words (Focus on the Bible); Richard S. Hess – Joshua (Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries); David M. Howard – Joshua (New American Commentary); Marten Woudstra – The Book of Joshua (New International Commentary on the Old Testament); James Montgomery Boice – Joshua (Boice Expositional Commentary).

“We shouldn’t try to find in Scripture the kinds of things the authors of Scripture never intended to explain; rather, we should try to find the kinds of things in Scripture that the authors of Scripture intended to explain, on their own terms, not ours.”

— Drew Reynolds -

Three Modern Myths

There are three modern myths in interpreting Genesis 1 according to Dr. Poythress, and in interpreting much else in Scripture. The first myth is what we spent the most time discussing so far, the myth of scientistic metaphysics, which essentially holds that we know a lot more scientifically now than the ancients did then, so we can assume that whereas we are knowledgeable and correct, they were ignorant and wrong. The second myth is the myth of progress, which says that “since science gives us more knowledge and more gadgets, we are getting better and better scientifically, religiously, morally, and in our understanding of ourselves and God (Eden, 77). The third myth is the myth of understanding cultures from facts, which is essentially “the idea that we can study and understand a culture effectively with a dose of armchair learning about the facts. ‘After all,’ says popular thinking, ‘everyone else is like us, except that variant customs and beliefs are plugged in at appropriate places here or there’” (Eden, 80).

Go Back and Actually Read Everything Above before You Read This

There is so much more I’d like to say, but for those who have made it this far in the article (and have actually and honestly read everything up till this point), I’d like to close with two quotations. First, for those who have disagreements with the arguments and conclusions in this article, please don’t be unreasonable, but rather, reasonable. Don’t fulfill the words in the first quotation from Pastor Michael Foster, “You can’t reason with people who want to misunderstand you. There are honest misunderstandings, and then there are cultivated misunderstandings. You have to learn to discern the difference.” Don’t be that guy. Like my pastor, Jeff Durbin would say, we’re at the last point for real now. It’s a little long, but full of solid gold if you are reading to understand. May that be true of you. Here it is, from Vern Poythress in Eden under the section The Sacred in Modern Thinking: “I call the three mistaken modern notions myths for four reasons. First, they are not true, but distortions of truths. Second, they function at a popular level and are seldom challenged at that level. Rather, they underlie and guide the global directions of people’s thinking. They have coherent social functions, and that is one reason why they endure and propagate from one person to another. Third, though not all the myths have a prominent narrative structure, they all interlock with and depend on the second myth, the myth of progress, which definitely employs a narrative. The myth of progress is the story of enlightenment triumphing over darkness. Fourth, the myths are sacred, particularly the first myth (scientistic metaphysics) and to some extent the second [myth of progress]. People are tempted to respond to critical questions about the myths not with careful analysis, but with mere dismissal, or with astonishment that anyone would be so obtuse as to entertain doubts. Because the myths have an important role in guiding people’s thinking, to question or abandon them threatens to leave people spiritually and intellectually ‘naked,’ disoriented and frightened by the loss of familiar landmarks. People’s stake in them is deep. People give their allegiance. They live their lives based on them. In practice, the myths are treated in the same way that we treat what is sacred” (Eden, 94-95).